Please Let Andrew Breitbart Finish

Once upon a time, he was "Matt Drudge's bitch." (His words, not ours.) But now Andrew Breitbart has his own right-wing media kingdom, a gift for scandal (dismantling ACORN, steamrolling Shirley Sherrod, mentoring conservative prankster-slash-NPR-dismantler James O'Keefe), and this month a new book, Righteous Indignation: Excuse Me While I Save the World! If nothing else, it proves the man has a sense of humor. Our favorite joke: He dedicated the book to his hero, Clarence Thomas. Wait, that's not a joke?

Give me your dream ticket for 2012.

Allen West [R-Fla.] and Michele Bachmann [R-Minn.].

You like Bachmann?

Yes. I've been proven correct so many times on this basic assumption: If the media is out to destroy a person in the political realm—and it's always a conservative Republican—then that person must be someone they fear greatly.

Not Sarah Palin?

I think the presidency is beneath her. There's more power in being Oprah Winfrey than in being Barack Obama. It would be my goal for Palin to become Oprah and be the ultimate kingmaker for twenty-odd years. Oprah anointed Barack Obama.

**Your book jacket says that you're "one of the most polarizing figures of our time." That's a compliment? **

Yes. The media is dominated by people who disagree with American exceptionalism—the academic Marxist crowd's worldview—and somebody needed to start taking it on directly. The Right has focused its energy and money on the political process, and it just kind of shrugged off culture. But culture is everything in this country. Once you get down to the political level, you've already lost the battle. I sleep so well at night taking on these people who I've isolated as the problem. It's not Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama. It's Katie Couric, Brian Williams. It's Paramount and Sony and the people in Hollywood who hide their message in art. And that's why it's so potent-

**I only have 1000 words, honey. **

I'm sorry. I get riled up.

**Who's the worst person in Hollywood? **

Ari Emanuel. Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, David Geffen. It's the power brokers in the town who maintain this orthodoxy. Thirty years ago I would have said the most obnoxious aspect of Hollywood is the casting couch. Hollywood has traded in the casting couch for the political fundraiser. The first thing that a young lady who gets off the Greyhound Bus learns is to see and be seen at liberal-based fundraisers.

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You really think that's the first thing they learn?

One hundred percent.

**What exactly is your mission? **

To expose the counternarrative that has been hidden by those controlling the reins of popular culture. This battle is so in my blood. Every day, I wake up and look at my wristband and it says, "What would Andrew do?"

You have that on a wristband?

No, this is a metaphorical wristband.

OK, so then what is your ultimate goal?

I said this jokingly on a red-eye at 3am to Markos Moulitsas from the Daily Kos: my goal is to take down the institutional left. And he mocked me. I was like, "OK, Marcos. You just dared me, and when you dare me, I'm gonna do it." Now we're going after Planned Parenthood-

How are you going after Planned Parenthood? In what way?

They're a corrupt organization!

**How so? **

These people are the best service industry professionals in the history of the world. They have a dark soul. But let me just say something about Planned Parenthood: I'm pro-life, but it's because I'm selfish and adopted. It's not because of some grand theological overview. Nothing drives me crazier than seeing an abortion van driving along at a conservative convention showing aborted fetuses. I think that's the wrong aesthetic. Randall Terry shoving fetuses in people's faces is wrong.

Do you think Planned Parenthood is going to be your next ACORN?

It's not my ACORN. But yeah, I do.

Why do liberals have such boring radio shows?

I wish I could give you a more clever answer, but it's because they exist in an environment in which they don't have to ever argue their points. Conservatives know what liberals think because we have to swim in their waters.

How much money do you make?

I don't want to get into that type of thing. But when people call me a media mogul, I say to them, "Why do I have a mortgage?"

And four kids!

Yeah. I live a comfortable upper middle class existence. The difference between me and many in Hollywood is that they have insatiable appetites, and I go into Costco along with the hoi polloi and I say, "This is enough. The American middle class experience is more than enough for me." Whereas they wake up and they see the glass is half-empty and that they're living in hell on earth, because it's not up to their Gomorrah-esque liking. They sit there with their fresh squeezed orange juice and their 50-inch LCD screen and they take their daughter to a tennis lesson in their Escalade, and they somehow think they're living in a bad country. They constantly see the country as half-empty.

Did you ever think you'd have four kids?

No. I call it Unplanned Parenthood.

**You write about having ADD. Do you take anything for it? **

No. The Internet was the thing that focused me. It was not Ritalin.

**What does ADD feel like when you're at your computer? **

I've got maybe four or five instant messenger conversations going on at the same time. I've got about five or six tabs in Firefox going. I'm probably talking on my cell phone while I'm monitoring my Fantasy baseball team, knowing the pitch count of the Milwaukee Brewers/Cincinnati Reds game. There is no disappointment in my life greater than plugging in my computer and not seeing the wireless sign. I would rather be in steerage—in the middle seat—with wireless than in first class with the Air Singapore stewardess massaging my toes.

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